


Historic Features

by flawedamythyst



Series: Historic Features [1]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Ghosts, Canon-Typical Violence, M/M, This is mostly schmoop though, homophobic violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-27
Updated: 2018-06-27
Packaged: 2019-05-29 12:56:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 19,254
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15073619
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flawedamythyst/pseuds/flawedamythyst
Summary: “Electrical surges with no source, and music coming from the air, and that damn baseball game no one was watching, and I swear I sometimes hear voices right on the edge of hearing when I should be alone,” said Tony. “What does that sound like to you?”“Sounds like-” said Steve, then hesitated. Tony gave him a pointed look. “Sounds like a haunting,” he finished, reluctantly.“Oh no,” said Clint, in tones of mock-horror. “Ghosts!”Bucky laughed and kissed him. “Man, I hope they’re friendly.”Clint and Bucky are haunting the new apartment that Tony bought in Brooklyn to try and impress Steve.





	Historic Features

**Author's Note:**

> Technically this is major character death, but they're dead before the story begins, and it doesn't stop them from having a damn good time, so I decided not to warn. Everyone still exists in the same state at the end of the fic as they did at the start.
> 
> Huge thanks to Tanouska for betaing.

The apartment took up almost the entire top floor of the building, with a view over a couple of lower buildings to Coffey Park. When Clint and Bucky had moved there, eight tiny bedsits had shared the same space, but the big renovation thirty years ago had knocked through most of the walls and turned it into a fancy, modern place with a massive open kitchen/lounge, four bedrooms and ‘historic features’, whatever the hell that meant. Clint always rolled his eyes at Bucky when the realtors came out with that line.

“Don’t look so scathing, I’m pretty sure she means us,” said Bucky, nudging his shoulder against Clint’s. They were perched together on the kitchen counter as a couple followed the realtor around, asking questions about schools in the area and the local community.

Clint made a dismissive noise. “We’re not a feature, we’re a glitch,” he said. “Hey, these guys have kids, right?”

“Yeah,” said Bucky, gloomily. “Young ones too, I think. There’s a teething ring in her bag.”

“Ugh,” said Clint. Children were noisy, and some of them saw too much.

The woman paused on the way through to the bedrooms, running her hand over a ‘shabby chic’ brick wall that the renovators had left in. “There’s a lot of hard surfaces,” she said to her husband. “Sharp corners.”

He rolled his eyes. “You can’t wrap them in cotton wool, Carrie.”

Right, okay. Clint blinked over to where they were heading through the doorway and gave the guy the smallest nudge at just the right time for him to crack his head against the sharp edge of the door frame.

“Fuck,” he swore, grabbing at his head.

“Maybe I should be wrapping you in cotton wool,” said Carrie. “If you can’t avoid injuring yourself, how can we expect a three-year-old to?”

Mission accomplished. Clint turned back to Bucky and gave him a thumbs up.

Bucky rolled his eyes. “A bit violent, but I guess it works.”

“Kids would end up sleeping in our room,” Clint pointed out. “Even if they can’t see us, it’s awkward making out with you when there's a toddler in the room.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” said Bucky, blinking over to Clint so he could wrap his arms around him and kiss his forehead, cool lips tingling as they pressed against him. “Just, at some point we’ll have to let someone move in.”

“At some point,” agreed Clint, thinking that he’d be happy to have the place to themselves a bit longer.

****

The first they knew that someone had finally bought the apartment was a gang of contractors turning up one day. They overhauled the whole place, wired it up with a bunch of gadgets Clint didn’t have a hope of recognising, moved the kitchen counters all around for no good reason he could see, and even widened the window in the main bedroom.

“Some rich asshole,” said Bucky, glumly, watching as a carpenter built in a huge wet bar opposite the windows in the lounge.

“This isn’t exactly the kinda place that normal folks can afford anymore,” Clint pointed out.

“Just, would be nice to have someone we can relate to.”

Clint snorted. “We’ve been dead eighty years, who the fuck can we relate to?”

Bucky made a face, but he conceded the point.

Clint had been hoping the workmen would leave Bucky and Clint’s room alone, but on the third day, two of them spent the morning installing a matt black box below the window sill, while a third ran wires all through the plaster.

“This is shitty as fuck,” said Clint as they carefully lowered some gadget covered in flashing lights inside the box. “This is our fucking room, why the hell are they filling it up with their stupid modern gadgets?”

“I like stupid modern gadgets,” said Bucky, but he was frowning at the box too. Something about it was unsettling, like a fingernail being dragged down a chalkboard.

“I don’t,” said Clint, and kicked at it. His foot connected with a thud, surprising him and freaking the fuck out of the workmen.

“Wow, apparently,” said Bucky, raising an eyebrow at Clint as the workmen panicked about mysterious noises and damage to their stupid flashing box.

Clint shrugged and turned away. He hadn’t intended to actually kick it, but apparently he felt strongly enough about the violation of their space to have put more emotion into the movement than he meant to.

“Hey,” said Bucky, coming over to wrap his arms around Clint and hold him close. “Still our room, right? Always gonna be, no matter what they do.” 

There was a tug as he drew time back around them, recreating the memory they both shared of how the room should look. Clint let it take him, watching as the walls melted back through layers of plaster and wallpaper, back through the big redevelopment that had taken out the divide between the two rooms that had made up their apartment, back through the near-derelict state it had been in before that, until it had returned to the shabby familiarity of the place they’d lived in. Two beds shoved right together, because no one ever came in who’d raise an eyebrow; a dresser that was half-empty because they only had money for the important things; Bucky’s leather jacket on the peg by the door and Clint’s bow leaning against the wall; a washstand with a half-empty bowl of water in the corner, because the bathroom was all the way down the hall and shared with four other apartments.

“It’s always gonna be this place for us,” said Bucky, spinning Clint slowly around in his arms. 

“Yeah, okay,” agreed Clint, letting the itch of the box, and whatever else the contractors were doing, ease from the back of his mind. “Our perfect Brooklyn lovenest.”

Bucky laughed and kissed him, pushing him back towards the beds, and by the time they were ready to let go of the memory, the contractors had all cleared out for the day.

After that came decorators, painting and varnishing and putting in new carpets. Only then came the army of removal guys, bringing in furniture that all looked suspiciously brand new and hundreds of boxes of seemingly endless stuff. Everything got unpacked without any sign of the new owner, all under the direction of a harassed-looking woman with a clipboard.

“Remember when we moved in?” Clint asked, crossing his legs on the bed in the master bedroom and watching a woman unpack underwear into a drawer. Men’s underwear, and he really wasn’t sure how the hell anyone thought it was okay to get a stranger to do that for them.

“Three duffle bags, a sack of books, and a box of whatever household stuff my mom could spare?” said Bucky. “Yeah, it was a bit different.”

After everything had been arranged and the woman had gone around one last time with her clipboard, they all cleared out, and then nothing happened for a week.

“All that effort and we’ve still got the place to ourselves,” said Bucky.

“That's not a bad thing,” said Clint. 

“Kinda boring,” said Bucky with a shrug.

“I guess,” said Clint. He frowned at a canvas that looked like the artist had dropped his paint pot on it. “I could do with some better art.”

“Are you saying I’m not a work of art?” asked Bucky, leaning back against a wall with his arms above his head like a pin-up girl.

He was in the last outfit he’d worn before he’d been taken to the hospital and they’d changed him into one of their gowns for the last few hours before he’d died. He had his suspenders hanging around his waist and his shirt half-unbuttoned, which was a good look for him. Even after all the decades they’d been together, he still managed to take Clint’s breath away.

Metaphorical breath, obviously, Clint’s actual breath had been taken away for good in a far more dramatic fashion.

“You’re my favourite work of art,” said Clint, taking hold of Bucky’s waist and leaning in for a kiss.

Which, of course, was when someone finally turned up to take residence. Keys rattled in the lock and Clint pulled away from Bucky’s mouth to look as the door swung open.

The guy who came through was already mid-conversation with someone on his phone. “-seriously, actual keys, like this is the eighties or something, Pep, it’s adorable, and the elevator had buttons you had to push yourself, it’s hilarious.”

He was juggling a heavy metal case and a laptop bag, which he dumped on the nearest chair as he came in. “Oh no, no, I’m keeping it. Actual keys? Steve’s gonna love it. Oh, oh, I can get a novelty keyring, I don’t think I’ve ever had one. And one for Steve, of course, of Justice or The American Way or- Okay, no, Pep, where’s the confidence? Of course Steve’s gonna want a set of keys, have you seen this place? And it’s closer to the precinct than his place, that’s gotta count for something.” 

He headed straight for the bar, mixing himself a drink with familiar movements despite never having seen the place before.

“No, Pep, that’s not- No! It’s perfect. It’s totally going to work, best plan I’ve ever had, no idea why you’re doubting me. I have to go, got to get JARVIS installed or it’s never gonna be home. Yeah, I know, see, that’s why I need JARVIS, so he can remind me and, no, Pep, Pep, Pep...hang on, going through a tunnel.” He hung up and dumped the phone on the bar.

“And you thought kids would be noisy,” said Bucky.

The guy glanced around at the room, swirling the ice in his glass. “Okay, JARVIS, where do you want your new home to be?”

“I’m sure you’ll find me somewhere suitable,” said the phone in a crisp, British voice.

“Aw, this is gonna be hell,” said Clint. “Can we haunt him out now?”

“Nope,” said Bucky. “You know the rule. We give him a week, then we vote.”

Stupid rules.

****

The guy wandered the apartment with his drink for a bit, looking around and glancing in cupboards. When he went into Bucky and Clint’s room, Clint stood in the doorway with his arms crossed as if he could stop him going in, trying not to shiver as the guy passed right through him.

Bucky trailed him around the room, hovering so close behind him that when the guy stopped to glance out the window, Bucky passed through into him briefly.

They might not have decided whether or not they were going to let the guy stay, but they were both fiercely territorial about their space and they’d learnt a long time ago that a little bit of unseen intimidation sometimes made people uncomfortable enough to decide the room was best left empty.

Either it worked or the guy had no real plans for the room anyway, because he didn’t hang around. He opened the black box to check on the flashing lights within, which made Clint twitch because he really fucking hated that thing, hated having it in their space, scraping at the edges of his nerves. Apparently it was all working fine, because he shut the box again, then went back to the lounge. He tipped down the last of the drink and set the empty glass on the bar, then rubbed his hands together. 

“Okay, JARVIS, let’s make this place worthy of Tony Stark.”

“Tony Stark,” repeated Clint as Bucky slung an arm around his shoulders. “Sounds like a dick name.”

“You really don’t like this guy, huh?” said Bucky.

“Look at him,” said Clint. “He had other people do every stroke of work for him. Lazy shit.”

Stark pulled off his jacket and chucked it on a chair, rolled up his shirt sleeves, then opened up his metal case to reveal a whole set of tools and electrical items.

“I think he’s about to do some work now,” said Bucky.

“Aw, come on,” muttered Clint as Stark started pulling bits out, “why does the universe always go out of its way to prove me wrong?”

Bucky shrugged. “Maybe it holds a grudge cuz you’re so damn pretty?”

“Flatterer,” said Clint, turning to press a kiss to his mouth.

****

Stark spent the rest of the day installing a bunch of stuff that looked like it had been plucked straight out of science fiction to Clint.

“Hey, you think he’ll watch baseball?” asked Bucky after Stark had turned an entire wall into a television, somehow.

“Nah, seems more like the polo type,” muttered Clint, because Bucky had got all excited about the flashy tech and it was making him grumpy. If he could still get hold of a bow, he’d be able to make Bucky’s face light up like that, but he hadn’t even touched a riser since they’d died.

“Polo could be fun,” said Bucky, but he didn’t sound convinced. “I mean, just seeing any sports would be a change.”

The last inhabitants had been two unmarried sisters who’d moved in together after they’d both retired. They’d spent most of their time baking, organising charity events, and bickering over whether or not they should get a cat. When one of them had died, the other had stayed on for a few months, talking to herself more with every passing week. Clint had thought it’d end with her finally get that cat so she had someone to talk to, but instead she sold up and moved to a home.

Probably a good thing. Cats didn’t tend to like sharing their space with Clint and Bucky.

“Remember the baseball match with the Cubs in ‘36?” asked Bucky, nudging Clint with his hip.

That was dirty pool, especially as Clint could already feel him tugging at the memory. Ah, screw it, there was no sense in staying here and watching this asshole fiddle with his little electronics.

“Of course I do,” said Clint, pushing at time along with Bucky until they were back in the washroom they’d escaped to in the ninth innings.

“First time I knew I loved you,” said Bucky, now dressed in what he’d had on then, pale blue button-down shirt and a Dodgers hat. He pressed Clint back against the wall of the washroom, ignoring the cubicle where they’d done this the first time around.

“I know,” said Clint, because after all this time, they both knew everything about the other. He cupped a hand around Bucky’s cheek, stroking over his stubble.

“I was watching Ed Brandt strike out Gabby Hartnett and I glanced over at you,” continued Bucky, as Clint had known he would. No sense in stopping telling the story just because they both knew the rhythm of it. “I could see you weren’t having a great time, which is nuts because baseball is awesome-”

“Sure, sweetheart,” said Clint, patting his cheek and getting the eyeroll he’d been aiming for.

“I thought ‘ah crap, I’m boring the guy, this is gonna be a shitty date’,” said Bucky, “then you glanced over at me, met my eyes, and your whole face just lit up.”

Clint grinned at him, because he liked that part of the story. He liked how reverent Bucky always sounded about whatever smile Clint had given him back then.

“Yeah, just like that,” said Bucky, leaning in to kiss him. “And I realised you were happy just seeing me having a good time, even if the game wasn’t your kinda thing. And I just, fuck Clint. Such a wave of love for you.”

Clint kissed him, and finished the story. “And then you grabbed me, pulled me out mid-innings, and brought me here to have your wicked way with me,” he said. “It definitely wasn’t a shitty date after that.”

Bucky laughed. “I just can’t believe we didn’t get caught.”

“Not then,” said Clint.

A shadow crossed Bucky’s face. “Yeah, not then,” he agreed, then leaned in to kiss Clint again. “And not this time either.”

When they stepped back from the memory, Stark was hunched over a screen, tapping with furious fingers. “Okay, JARVIS, download complete in 3...2...1. How you feeling, buddy?”

“I have full access to the apartment systems,” said the British voice, but it wasn’t coming from Stark’s phone anymore, it came from the ceiling.

“Hey, thought we were the ones haunting this place,” said Clint, frowning around at the apartment.

“I guess a British ghost is classier than a greasemonkey and an ex-carnie,” said Bucky, going around to look at whatever Stark was tapping at on his screen. “Oh wow, Clint, you should see this.”

Clint crossed his arms and collapsed onto a sofa. “Nope.”

“Okay, okay, there we go, temperature control, security systems, communications, windows...all running fine,” said Stark. “Start with putting up the heat, would you? It’s freezing in here.”

“The ambient temperature in this room appears to be several degrees lower than the rest of the apartment,” said JARVIS. Huh, it was almost like there was some kinda psychic phenomena that might be affecting the temperature in the room. Or maybe two of them. “I’m adjusting the heating to accommodate.”

The radiator next to Clint clicked into life. He glared at it. “Oh great, some smartass computer is going to be deciding what temperature we should be.”

“Okay, but isn’t this kinda incredible?” said Bucky. “It’s like the place is running itself.”

Stark tossed his screen onto the coffee table. “Okay, then run a scan for unexpected signals, just my luck if Hammertech already snuck bugs in. And check the ambient noise levels, yeah? They said there was soundproofing in the floor but I swear I heard someone listening to a baseball game.”

Clint exchanged a conspiratorial grin with Bucky. “Fancy that.”

“I’ll monitor sound levels,” said JARVIS.

Bucky’s grin turned mischievous and he leaned in close to Stark’s ear. “ _Take me out to the ball game,_ ” he whispered.

Stark flailed and spun around as Bucky backed up, laughing. “JARVIS, did you hear that?”

“I thought we weren’t haunting him out yet,” said Clint.

Bucky shrugged. “We’re not, just couldn’t resist. C’mon, we can have a bit of fun, he seems like he could take a joke.”

“And if he can’t, we’ll definitely be haunting him out,” said Clint, grinning as Stark shook his head, apparently deciding to throw off the moment.

“Sure,” agreed Bucky, blinking across the room to sit next to Clint, stretching out along the sofa. “Doesn’t matter how fancy a guy’s gadgets are, I’m not living with someone who doesn’t have a sense of humour.”

“Full scan of the apartment complete,” said JARVIS. “No unexpected signals, although the background electrical levels are higher than normal.”

Stark’s head whipped up. “Gonna be a problem?”

“They are not high enough to affect my systems,” said JARVIS, “and the shielding around the server is sufficient to protect it unless the levels spike.”

Clint tucked an arm around Bucky, pulling him in close and resting his cheek to the top of Bucky’s head. “Think that’s us as well?”

Bucky shrugged. “It would make sense,” he said. “Fuck knows how we exist, but I could see us pinging as an electrical surge.”

“If he’s got all this fancy tech monitoring everything, do you think he’ll spot us?” asked Clint. He wasn’t sure he liked the idea. What if Stark decided to get someone in to try and turf them out?

“No idea,” said Bucky.

Stark was packing up his kit, still talking out loud to his computer, although it had descended into technical talk that Clint didn’t understand much of. He let his eyes shut rather than pay attention, enjoying the feel of Bucky’s cool body in his arms. “My favourite electrical surge,” he muttered, and earned himself a snort of amusement.

****

There was no sign of anyone else moving in with Stark although from the amount he talked at his computer, it seemed like there were two people around anyway. Clint got sick of the endless flood of noise and went back to his and Bucky’s room, where Bucky followed him even though he was finding all the tech fascinating.

The next morning, Stark put on one of the expensive suits that had been unpacked for him into a closet and left, which was a bit of a relief.

“At this rate I’m gonna want to haunt him out just to get some peace,” said Clint, hovering over the coffee mug Stark had left and wishing there was some way for him to taste the couple of inches left in the bottom. He missed coffee. “I thought you were meant to get some quiet once you were dead?”

“Quiet gets boring,” said Bucky. “It’s not like we get entertainment from anywhere else.”

Clint wasn’t having that. “Hey, I’m the entertainment,” he said. “C’mon, you’re here with the amazing Hawkeye, star of Carlton’s circus and favourite of European royalty!” He hopped up onto the kitchen counter to pose dramatically, sending his outfit back to the memory of the lurid purple costume he’d used to wear to perform.

“European royalty?” asked Bucky, sceptically, taking a couple of steps back to get a better view.

Clint shrugged. “That’s what the posters said. We wouldn’t possibly have lied on the posters, right?”

“Of course not,” said Bucky. “Okay, go on then. Wow me.”

That would be easier if he had a bow, but Clint wasn’t about to let a challenge like that go unanswered. He raised up his arms, eyed the fancy light fitting in the centre of the ceiling, then took a running leap, somersaulting so that he caught it with his legs and swung for a moment like a trapeze artist. 

The fitting should have been creaking under his weight, if not actually falling down, but it only gave a vague shiver. If Clint hadn’t been concentrating on connecting, it wouldn’t even have done that, but he also would have passed straight through and fallen to the floor. The lights flickered on, but he was already flipping back down to land on his feet.

Bucky applauded and gave him a long wolf whistle. “Consider me wowed,” he said. “Although, it was more impressive when we were alive and, you know, natural forces actually worked on you.”

Clint shrugged. “Eh, it’s not like I need to impress you now. You’re stuck with me.”

The light turned off again. He wondered if the computer was aware enough to be confused, or if it was just reacting to whatever sign of his stunt had gone through to the living world; the temperature change or electrical surge or whatever.

“Yeah,” agreed Bucky happily, wrapping his arms around Clint. “An eternity with my best guy, hard to beat that.”

“We could get a dog,” suggested Clint, kissing him. “Everything’s better with a dog.”

****

Clint was watching the sun go down over the distant trees of Coffey Park from their window when he heard Stark come back. He turned to make a face at Bucky.

“Feels like you’re not really giving him the benefit of the doubt,” said Bucky. Clint didn’t bother replying. He blinked into the main lounge so that he could glare at Stark when he came in, and Bucky followed a split-second later.

Once again, Stark was already talking as he came into the apartment, but this time he at least had someone with him, a tall blond guy in a cop uniform with a wary look on his face.

“Check it out, look at that view, it’s great, right?” said Stark, gesturing around at the windows. “You said you like that park.”

“I did,” agreed the guy, walking over to look at the view for a moment, then turning back to raise an eyebrow at Stark. “That still doesn’t tell me what’s going on. Whose place is this?”

“Mine, of course,” said Stark. “I moved in yesterday and got JARVIS installed, so it’s pretty much home now. Anywhere with JARVIS is home, right?”

“I’m flattered, sir,” said the computer.

The guy stared at Stark. “You bought an apartment in Brooklyn?” he asked, looking around again. “Jesus, Tony, you’ve got a massive penthouse in Manhattan, a mansion in Malibu and god knows how many other houses, why do you need an apartment here?”

“Oh wow, he’s really rich,” said Bucky, sounding impressed. Clint scowled.

“And smug about it,” he added, bitterly. The tiny place he’d had with Bucky had been the first proper home he’d had since his parents died when he was a kid. That was why he was so attached to it, he guessed. After being bounced around orphanages, then travelling with the circus and just sleeping wherever there was space, and finally living in a men’s hostel when he first washed up in Brooklyn, having an actual space with a front door where he and Bucky could build a life together had felt like more riches than a penthouse in Manhattan or a mansion in Malibu.

“Stark Industries has a corporate penthouse in Manhattan,” Stark corrected, “it’s not really homey, you know, and yeah, okay, so I’ve got a place in Malibu, but I seem to be spending a whole lot more time over on this coast, so I figured it made sense to have somewhere to live here. Close to the local amenities, you know.” He tipped the guy a wink.

“Homey?” repeated the guy, sceptically. “Tony, it’s decorated exactly the same as the penthouse. Did you use the same designer? Jesus, even the art looks the same.”

Stark rolled his eyes. “I have no idea, my assistant dealt with all that shit, that’s not really the point, who cares what colour the walls are? It’s gonna be homey because I’m gonna live here. Make it a home.”

The guy laughed, ducking his head and clearly giving in. “Okay, fine. Tony Stark has an apartment in Red Hook, I guess the place really is getting gentrified.”

“Maybe I’m just learning how to rough it,” said Stark, heading for the bar. “You want a drink?”

“Tony, this is not roughing it,” said the guy. “You got a beer?”

Tony pulled a bottle out of the mini fridge and cracked the top off to slide over to him before starting to fix himself a whiskey. “And if you don’t like the art, you could always paint me something different to go in here, you know I would love that, Steve. Come on, paint me something, give me a Rogers original, I’ll even pose for you if you want. Steve, Steve, paint me like one of your French girls.”

“Hey, are they like us?” asked Bucky, straightening up and blinking over to Steve’s side, where he could frown at Stark.

“No way,” said Clint. “Stark’s way too annoying, he’s nothing like us.”

Steve took a long drink from his beer before responding, in a voice that meant it wasn’t the first time he’d had to say it, “I’m not doing a nude portrait of you, Tony. You’ve got enough ego as it is.”

Clint blinked next to Bucky so that he could look at what kind of beer Steve was drinking. “Remember sitting on the rooftop?” he asked.

Bucky turned a grin on him. “Oh yeah, that’s a good one. And the sun’s going down now.”

Clint took the initiative on turning time back to the memory, taking Bucky’s hand so that he could lead him over to where the rickety fire escape had clung to the building back when they’d been alive. They climbed out the window and up to the spot on the roof where they’d used to sit with a pack of beer, leaving Stark and his friend to have their own drinks.

Clint was able to pinpoint the memory just right so that a pack of Schaefer beer was waiting for them in their usual spot. Back when they’d been alive, they’d taken care to leave at least a foot between each other as they dangled their legs off the building and watched the sunset. They hadn’t been the only residents who liked to sneak up to the roof on nice evenings, after all.

Now, though, they could settle down with their thighs pressed together. Bucky popped the cap off a beer and passed it to Clint before opening his own, then wrapped an arm around him.

“Perfect,” he said, taking a swig.

Clint leaned into his body and watched the sun descending into an orange haze at the skyline. “Yep,” he agreed.

****

By the time they came back down, Stark and Steve were eating take out and watching some movie.

“Guess he’s not the sports type,” said Clint.

Bucky huffed out a sigh. “What’s the use of a giant screen if you’re not showing a ball game on it?”

Something blew up on screen, and Clint stared at it. “I don’t know, this seems like a pretty good use of it.” He blinked over to perch on the back of one of the sofas, then made eyes at Bucky until he joined him. 

The sisters hadn’t watched these kinds of movies so Clint hadn’t really been aware of how much special effects had changed recently. Watching some guy running around with a gun, blowing things up and wiping out whole hoards of bad guys, was more than worth having to put up with Stark in their space.

After the movie, Steve got up to leave.

“You could stay,” said Stark. “Plenty of room here and I bet I could find some clothes in your size. You know, it’s closer to your work, so the commute would be shorter tomorrow.”

Steve snorted, but he looked amused. “You just always try and get that little bit more, don’t you, Tony?” He leaned down to gently kiss him, cupping his hand around the back of Tony’s neck. 

Bucky twitched. “Holy fuck, they _are_ like us.”

“You’ve got me this far, give me a bit to catch up before we rush on to the next thing,” Steve said, quietly.

“Yeah, okay,” agreed Stark, looking a bit dazed. Steve grinned at him, kissed him again, and left.

Stark let out a long slow breath, tipping his head back to rest against the sofa. He grinned up at the ceiling, and Clint couldn’t help remembering the blissful euphoria he’d had the first time Bucky had kissed him like that.

“It looks very new,” he pointed out.

“All the more reason to see if we can help out,” said Bucky. “Fellas like us deserve to be happy.”

“Yeah, okay,” said Clint, because Stark might never stop talking, and had all this fancy technology that Bucky kept making eyes at, but if they could do anything to help two guys have a love story with a happier ending than his and Bucky’s, they should do that.

Not that they weren’t happy now, but Clint figured you should be able to be happy before you died, and not just in the afterlife.

“Sir,” said JARVIS, and Tony’s head jerked up. “Sorry to interrupt, but my systems have been showing a range of unexpected readings. I’ve been monitoring them, but haven’t yet been able to pinpoint a cause.”

Stark grabbed a screen off the table. “Show me.”

“That’ll be us, then,” said Bucky, leaning over as Tony scrolled through a whole series of numbers that meant nothing to Clint. “I’m guessing his other houses don’t have ghosts.”

“Temperature, background electrical surges, weird pressure readings, wow,” said Tony. “There is something funky going on with this place, you’re right, J. Kinda feels like we should be calling in Most Haunted.”

“I’m sure there is a rational explanation,” said JARVIS, which made Clint snigger. “I just thought you should know that we may need additional shielding around the server, and possibly some of my other systems.”

“Yeah, sure thing,” said Tony. “Keep monitoring. It’s probably shitty electrics in an old building, but I can’t work out how just yet, I need more data.”

“Of course, sir,” said JARVIS.

“Of course,” said Clint, “there’s nothing to say we won’t accidentally haunt him out without even trying, if this goes on. Doesn’t seem like a tech guy will hang around somewhere where his systems don’t work properly.”

“Maybe it’ll just take a bit more shielding,” said Bucky, but he didn’t sound very sure. Probably because he had as little idea of what that meant as Clint did.

****

Over the next week, Clint noticed a pattern. Tony didn’t actually seem to spend any time in the apartment unless Steve was with him. Once he’d spent a few hours putting more black boxes around various electronics, and doing something to the one in their room that made it itch even more at the back of Clint’s mind, he disappeared off to wherever it was he worked and pretty much only came back to crash out at night, if at all.

The exceptions were the two evenings Steve came over, when Tony got back in plenty of time to be there when Steve finished his shift. Both times they ordered take out and watched a movie, which seemed to show a lack of imagination to Clint.

“Our first few dates were more interesting than this, right?” he said to Bucky.

Bucky gave him a pointed look. “We didn’t start going on dates until after we’d blown each other in a handful of alleys. You think they should be following our model?”

Clint shrugged. “I remember those being pretty good blowjobs, they could do worse.”

Bucky conceded the point with a dipped head. “So, it’s been a week since he moved in,” he said, carefully.

Clint sighed. “Yeah.”

“Are we letting him stay, or haunting him out?” asked Bucky. “I’m all for letting him stay, so it’s up to you.”

Long ago, when they’d reluctantly conceded the necessity of having living people sharing their space, they’d made an agreement that they’d wait a week to get to know someone, then decide if they were happy living with them or not. The vote had to be unanimous; if either of them didn’t want someone in their home, they’d both do everything they could to make them leave. 

Clint stared at Tony, who still talked too much and had filled their home up with electronics, but who had carefully draped his arm around Steve’s shoulders as if he were a teenager trying out the yawn-and-stretch maneuver for the first time and was now grinning to himself because Steve had dropped a hand on his knee in response.

“Jesus, okay,” he grumbled. “He can stay. Unless he manages to fuck things up with Steve. If he breaks that guy’s heart I don’t want him around.”

“That seems fair,” said Bucky, taking Clint’s hand and squeezing it.

“Are you free Saturday?” asked Steve as the credits rolled on the movie.

“For you?” said Tony. “Always.”

Steve nodded. “Okay, then I’m taking you out to buy some stuff to make this place look a little less like a hotel room. And then, we’re going to the game.”

Bucky straightened up. “Oh, not fair.”

“The game?” asked Tony, as if the idea of sports was completely alien. “Baseball, right? That’s cool, Stark Industries has a box, we can-”

“Nope,” said Steve. “We’re going to sit in the cheap seats. I’ve got us tickets already. I told you, if we’re doing this, it’s not going to be you just throwing all the Stark money and glamour at me.”

“Right,” agreed Tony, “and I have been very fucking restrained, look at this. Chinese food and domestic beer and Netflix, like we’re college kids or something.”

Steve laughed. “Tony, you bought a whole apartment. That’s not restrained.”

“That wasn’t- That’s,” spluttered Tony, although Clint didn’t know why he was bothering to protest. He’d only known the guy a week, but it was already incredibly clear that Steve was the only reason he’d bought the place. “Okay, fine,” Tony gave in. “The ball game. But you’ll let me take out you out to dinner after, yeah? Burgers, there’s a good burger place and I promise it’s not glamorous.”

“I think I can allow that,” agreed Steve, grinning at him, and then leaning in to kiss him. “And, thanks, Tony. I do appreciate how hard you’re trying not to, you know. Be all Tony Stark about this.”

Tony ran a hand through his hair, smiling at him. “You’re more than worth it,” he said, “if we’re gonna get all sappy about this. Besides, it’s kinda fun living like the rest of the world rather than just popping on a tux and feeding you champagne until you succumb to my charms. That was getting kinda old.”

“Yeah, sounds like a nightmare,” said Clint, rolling his eyes.

Bucky laughed. “You always hated dressing up fancy.”

“But I liked when you dressed up fancy,” said Clint. “Remember your sister’s wedding? Damn, you looked sharp in that suit.”

“I remember nearly being late because we couldn’t keep our hands off each other,” said Bucky, grinning. “And, I remember this…”

He pulled them back through time, blinking them back to their room so that when their old apartment formed around them, soft music playing on the battered old radio he’d fixed up, they were in just the right position for him to take Clint in his arms and starting swaying.

“Yeah, this was good,” agreed Clint, wrapping his arms around Bucky’s waist and feeling the smooth fabric of the suit he’d worn back then under his hands. “I love you.”

Bucky smiled at him and pressed in for a kiss. “I love you too,” he said, then let the memory pull them back into running through the same things they’d said back then, after they’d got back from the wedding. “You know I’d marry you if I could, right?”

Clint knew that now, but back then he’d been completely gobsmacked by even the idea. “Fuck, Bucky. You can’t just go saying shit like that.”

“I can if I mean it,” said Bucky, and kissed him again. “We may have to hide from everyone else but I’m damned if I’m gonna hide from you. I love you, and I wanna spend my life with you. They won’t let us sign a fancy certificate or have a big party, but they can’t stop me saying the words.”

Clint drew in a shaky breath and kissed Bucky. “Yeah, okay,” he said, quietly. “Fuck it. I’d marry you if I could too. The rest of our lives actually sounds too short, but if it’s all we’ve got, then I’ll sign up for it.”

Bucky kissed him so thoroughly that they both lost track of the music, clinging on and losing themselves in each other. “I fucking love you,” said Bucky, once they’d pulled apart, emotion straining his voice. “All the sneaking around and pretending is shit, but it’s more than worth it, Clint. _You’re_ more than worth it. I swear, richer or poorer, sickness or health, all that. For the rest of our lives.”

“Richer or poorer, sickness or health,” repeated Clint. “I love you too, for the rest of our lives.” He went off script then, pulling away from the familiar tread of the past that they were following. “And beyond. Even death won’t do us part.”

“Definitely not,” said Bucky, and kissed him again. “You and me haunting this apartment until Brooklyn sinks into the sea.”

The moment was abruptly ruined by Tony throwing the door open eighty years in the future, rushing in and _through_ them, dragging them back to the present like a bungee rope. It didn’t feel so much like having cold water thrown on them as it did that they were the water being thrown, and Clint lost all grip on the memory.

Bucky, because he was the best, at least managed to keep hold of the radio, so the song kept playing as Tony threw open his stupid black box.

“JARVIS, hey, J, hang on,” he was saying as he did something frantic with the electronics inside.

“Sir, the surge has ended,” said JARVIS. “My systems are recovering.”

“What the hell was that?” asked Steve from the doorway.

“No idea,” said Tony. “J, run a full diagnostic, check there’s no damage.” He shut the box back up again and frowned at it. “Tomorrow we’re getting you a better shelter.” He lifted his head and frowned. “And...shit. Am I going crazy, or is there music?”

Steve paused, clearly concentrating. Clint smiled at Bucky, starting to sway them to the music again, and Bucky grinned back.

“Very faint, old-fashioned music?” said Steve.

Tony clicked his fingers. “That’s it. JARVIS?”

“My auditory receptors are picking up music,” said JARVIS, “but only in this room. There’s nothing even in the hall outside the open door, and there’s no source of music anywhere within range. I’m afraid I’m not able to explain it.”

Tony sighed and slumped. “Oh, come on,” he muttered. Clint twirled Bucky in a slow circle, then back into his arms.

“Tony,” said Steve sharply, straightening his shoulders and crossing his arms. “What’s going on?”

“Electrical surges with no source, and music coming from the air, and that damn baseball game no one was watching, and I swear I sometimes hear voices right on the edge of hearing when I should be alone,” said Tony. “What does that sound like to you?”

“Sounds like-” said Steve, then hesitated. Tony gave him a pointed look. “Sounds like a haunting,” he finished, reluctantly.

“Oh no,” said Clint, in tones of mock-horror. “Ghosts!”

Bucky laughed and kissed him. “Man, I hope they’re friendly.”

“Okay, okay, no, see, I knew hearing someone say it would make it clear how nuts it is,” said Tony, standing back up. “Must just be bad electrics and stress and, I don’t know, something completely rational. Or, hey! Maybe someone is trying to drive me mad, that works as well. Hammer would do something like that, although I’m not sure he’d be this subtle with it.”

Clint twirled Bucky again as the next chorus of the song began. “ _Thanks for the memory_ ,” he sang along, “ _of faults that you forgave, of rainbows on a wave-_ ”

“Stop!” said Tony, standing up. “That’s not the song, that’s another voice. Who’s singing along?!”

Clint cut himself off, trying not to look guilty. “Whoops, I thought you were the only one suffering my bad voice.”

“It was beautiful,” said Bucky, kissing him, and then joining in with the radio on the next couple of lines. “Thanks for the memory, of tinkling temple bells, alma mater yells, and Cuban rum.”

His voice was a little rough, but he sounded pretty much perfect to Clint.

“Tony, calm down,” said Steve. “It was probably a neighbour.”

Tony actually flailed his hands in the air. “J! Tell Steve about my downstairs neighbour.”

“Downstairs is owned by a Mrs. Petrova and also lived in by her two small children,” said Jarvis. “My records show that all three are currently at her brother’s house in Sheepshead Bay.”

“Plus there’s heavy soundproofing,” said Tony, stamping on the floor. “I made sure of that before I bought the place, I hate hearing other people around. No, okay, let’s treat this like a hypothesis. J, what are the records on people having died here? The last owner was selling because her sister died, wasn’t she?”

“Miss Norton had a stroke while at bridge club and died in The Brooklyn Hospital Center,” said JARVIS. “I’m afraid the online records only stretch back to 1976, and the only death I can find a record of in this building was on a ground floor. The janitor who worked here in 1994 had a heart attack in his cleaning cupboard.”

“That wasn’t music from 1994,” said Steve.

“No,” said Tony, “it was decades older. ‘30s or ‘40s.”

“1938,” said Bucky, because he liked to be right. He let the radio fade back to memory, along with the music. “Do you think he’s actually going to try and find us?”

Clint shrugged. “I thought he was a rational science guy,” he said. “If we lay low, he’ll probably decide it’s all just bad electrics or whatever else he was saying.”

“Steve,” said Tony, taking two steps towards him and putting a hand on Steve’s shoulder. “Steve, Officer Rogers, stalwart upholder of law and order. This place falls in the jurisdiction of your precinct, right?”

“Right,” said Steve, slowly.

“So, any violent deaths would be in the records there,” said Tony.

Steve sighed. “Tony, none of that’s online, I’d have to go dig through the paper files in the basement, and I’d have to come up with a good reason to my Captain for me to go down there.”

Tony drew himself up to his full height of not-very-high. “Your boyfriend is _suffering_ from a _bizarre_ and _unsettling_ haunting, and-”

“Boyfriend?” asked Steve, raising an eyebrow with a little smile.

Tony halted, then shrugged one shoulder casually, although it looked forced. “I’m going to a baseball game with you, I figured that says something.”

Steve grinned at him. “Okay, fine,” he said, wrapping his arms around Tony’s shoulders and kissing him. “Boyfriend. My melodramatic boyfriend who is reading too much into some weird music and an electrical surge.”

Tony held him back and let out a long sigh. “Okay, fine, maybe,” he said. “Kiss me again and I’ll forget about it.”

Steve did just that.

“I think we should be proud of them for that milestone,” said Bucky.

“I’d suggest some sort of positive reinforcement,” agreed Clint, “but I’ve no idea what we could do that wouldn’t freak Tony out more.”

“Maybe we should just try and avoid surging our electrical fields around his technology for a bit, then,” said Bucky.

By which he probably meant not doing anything too supernatural, like recreating any memories or blinking about the place. “Aw, but this is where all our best memories happened,” Clint said, sadly.

Bucky shrugged. “Just for a couple of days.” He waggled his eyebrows. “We could try creating some new ones instead,” he suggested, taking Clint’s hand. He glanced at the black box. “In the other room,” he added, and pulled him out through where Tony and Steve were still making out in the doorway to one of the other bedrooms.

****

The next day Tony built a...thing around his black box. It looked like a steel cage and it felt like a lump of rock sitting in Clint’s stomach.

“I don’t like that,” he said, glaring at it from the bed.

“Me neither,” said Bucky. “Guess if it’s going to protect his computer friend from us, we’ll just have to put up with it.”

Clint didn’t want to have to put up with it. “Don’t know why he can’t just put it in another room,” he muttered. “Or another apartment even. We were here first.”

“He doesn’t know that,” Bucky reminded him, but Clint wasn’t in the mood for rational comments like that.

Tony sat back on his heels when he was finished. “Okay, let’s see a surge getting through that baby, JARVIS.”

“I feel safer already, sir,” said the computer.

Even after Tony had packed up his tools and gone, Clint stayed where he was, glaring at the box as if he could make it disappear just by hating it with enough force.

“C’mon, it’s not that bad,” said Bucky.

“It’s exactly that bad,” said Clint, because the presence of the thing in their space _hurt_. He kicked at it.

The moment his foot connected, there was a spark and a flash, and he flew backwards as if he’d been electrocuted.

“Fuck! Clint!” shouted Bucky, blinking over to crash to his knees next to him.

Clint stared at him in shock. He hadn’t felt anything like that since they’d died. “I’m okay,” he said, because Bucky looked like he needed reassuring. He reached out for his hand and clung on. “Jesus though, that was...that actually hurt, I didn’t know we could hurt any more.”

The strength had been drained out of him, so he stayed where he was for a moment or two longer, trying to catch his metaphorical breath.

Bucky’s hand tightened around his. “Me neither,” he said, grimly, and the look he turned on the box was very dark. “Can you get up? I don’t- I don’t like seeing you lying here.”

It took Clint a moment to realise that he’d fallen on the exact same section of floor where he’d died. “Ugh, yeah, me neither,” he said, and sat up.

It was more of a struggle than he wanted it to be and for a moment he considered just blinking himself upright, but he didn’t know that he had the strength for that, either.

“Let’s get some space in between us and that fucking thing,” said Bucky, glaring at it.

Clint shook his head. “Nah, I need a rest,” he said. “I need our bed.”

“Right,” said Bucky, helping him stand up. He wrapped his arms around him and pulled them back to the memory of their apartment, to the two narrow beds pressed together where they’d spent so many nights curled up around each other.

“Perfect,” said Clint, collapsing into them and scooting across so that Bucky had space to climb after him and wrap his arms around Clint’s chest, pulling him back tight against his body. “I love you,” said Clint, patting at Bucky’s hand.

“I love you too,” said Bucky, pressing a kiss to the back of his neck.

This was always the place where Clint felt best, wrapped up in Bucky’s embrace and surrounded by the home they’d built for themselves. He could feel the shock of the incident fading away and he relaxed back into Bucky with a little sigh of happiness.

Bucky kissed his neck again. “No more touching that thing,” he said. “I don’t like being scared for you. I kinda thought I was done with that once we were both dead.”

“Sure thing,” said Clint, letting his eyes fall shut. “I promise not to touch it, and definitely not to die again.”

Bucky snorted his amusement at that, but his arms tightened and Clint thought that maybe it was too early for joking about this.

Or maybe it was still too early to joke about him dying. It had only been eighty years, after all.

****

Steve came to pick Tony up on Saturday. Bucky hovered by him, scowling at his Yankees shirt, then flicked himself into the memory of his old Dodgers cap.

“Okay,” said Tony, sliding his wallet and keys into his pocket. “Where are we going? Pepper said there are some boutiques that might have some stuff, or-”

“We’re going to Ikea,” said Steve.

Tony stopped dead and stared at him. “Ikea?” he repeated.

“Yup,” said Steve. “It’s real close.”

Tony opened his mouth as if he were going to say something, then shut it again. “Ikea,” he repeated again, in a weaker voice. “Okay.”

Steve’s grin grew. “Don’t look so freaked out, it’s just a store,” he said. “And we can have meatballs after.”

“Meatballs,” said Tony. “Okay, okay, I see how this is, you’re trying to see if you can scare me off, but I’m a Stark and we’re made of sterner stuff than that.” He straightened his shoulders. “Ikea on a Saturday morning. Bring it.”

“It really won’t be that bad,” said Steve, putting a hand on Tony’s shoulder as he guided him out of the apartment.

Tony snorted derisively but Clint could see him moving in closer to Steve’s arm as the door shut behind them.

Bucky let out a sigh, pulling his cap off and turning it in his hands. “Fucking Yankees,” he muttered.

“He’s hardly gonna be a Dodgers fan,” Clint pointed out. “Not now they’re in-”

“Stop,” said Bucky, holding up a hand. “I told you. We’re not talking about that.”

Clint pressed his lips together and mimed zipping them.

****

Tony didn’t come back until very late, but he came back alone. He threw himself down on the sofa and stared up at the ceiling, then smiled to himself with a happy little look that made Clint want to ruffle his hair.

“Okay, it’s kinda cute watching him,” he admitted to Bucky.

Bucky crouched by Tony’s side. “He’s pretty gone on him. I can remember going home after the first couple of dates with you and just lying about with that kinda sappy expression.”

“You were pretty gone on me,” agreed Clint.

“I still am,” said Bucky, standing up. “You think these guys’ll be able to make it as long as we have?”

Clint shrugged. “Kinda relies on them both living a good long time, or hanging around after they’re dead.”

“Hey, J, had any more electrical problems?” asked Tony.

“Nothing that the new Faraday cage couldn’t handle,” said JARVIS. “There have continued to be anomalies in the temperature and pressure readings, though. I am reading a cold spot around where you are right now.”

Tony half sat and glanced around, looking right through Clint and Bucky. “Huh, okay,” he said. “I guess we’ll cut down on aircon bills in the summer. Keep monitoring, let me know if anything starts making sense. I tell you what, I’m gonna upgrade your temperature sensors, let’s see if we can get a full picture of what’s going on.”

“Of course, sir.”

Clint snorted. “I’m not sure I’ve ever managed to make sense. Even when I was alive.”

“You do kinda defy explanation,” agreed Bucky.

****

Several Ikea deliveries turned up the next day. Apparently Steve had managed to talk Tony into buying half the store, or at least buying enough to completely transform the apartment once he’d got it all in place.

“Wow, looks like someone actually lives here now,” said Clint as Tony threw cushions on the sofa.

“It’s still not incredibly personal,” Bucky pointed out. “Even we had your old circus poster, and that photo of us.”

“The quilt your mom made,” added Clint, because at the time he’d been blown away by living somewhere that had that kind of thing in it; family ties and proofs of parental love.

Tony put his hands on his hips to stare at the cushions, then moved one of them by a couple of inches.

“I get the feeling this making a house a home thing is new to him,” said Clint. “Like it was to me.”

Bucky slung his arm around Clint’s shoulders to pull him in for a rough sideways hug. “You did okay at it, in the end. We had a pretty good home.”

“We had the best home,” said Clint, putting his arm around Bucky’s waist in return. “We still do.”

The doorbell rang and Tony looked up from his contemplation of his new rug. “J, who the hell is that?”

“It’s Miss Potts, sir,” said JARVIS.

“Huh,” said Tony, and went to open the door.

Miss Potts turned out to be the ‘Pepper’ that Tony kept talking about. She was an efficient-looking redhead who came straight in and looked around the apartment before turning to raise an eyebrow at Tony.

“Tony Stark settles down,” she said, sounding amused.

Tony rolled his eyes as he shut the door behind her. “If you’re only here to mock…”

“Oh no, I’m here for something far more important,” she said and held up a takeout bag. “Brunch.”

Tony grinned. “Then we need mimosas,” he said, and headed for the bar.

“Redheads drinking mimosas,” said Clint, nudging Bucky.

Bucky turned to grin at him, taking his hands in his. “Yeah, that’s a good one.”

The room melted back through the decades to their shared memory of the dive bar that had been down the street from the hostel where Clint had stayed after the circus finally gave up struggling on despite the Depression and disbanded. He took himself over to sit on the stool at the bar where the warm beer he’d nursed for over an hour was waiting for him. He’d been putting off going back to the hostel and wallowing in misery over being stuck in Brooklyn where he didn’t know anyone and couldn’t get a better job than an occasional day labouring at the docks.

He hadn’t even noticed Natasha coming up to the bar at his elbow until she spoke. “The Amazing Hawkeye,” she said, and he turned to stare at her.

“The Black Widow,” he said, finding a grin for what had been the first time in days. “What the hell are you doing in Brooklyn?”

“Trying to find an employment opportunity for a retired acrobat that doesn’t end with me stabbing a man for taking liberties,” she said. “What about you?”

“Same,” said Clint. “Well, less stabbing.” He glanced at the barman, who was at the other end of the bar, and lowered his voice. “Plus I’d kinda like to find a guy who wanted to take liberties.”

She eyed him carefully, then glanced over her shoulder. The memory of Natasha was faded around the edges, but he was able to summon up her sly, I-know-something-you-don’t-know smile perfectly. “Buy me a drink, and I’ll find you one.”

“What are you having?” he asked immediately, signalling the bartender. 

“A mimosa,” she said, then met his disbelieving look with a smile. “Trust me, it’ll be worth it.”

She waited until she had the drink in her hand before she turned and nodded at a table in the corner. “You see the girl in the red skirt? She’s my room-mate. The guy next to her is her brother. She thinks she’s setting us up, but I spent too many years in the circus to not know when a guy is paying more attention to the broad-shouldered blond at the bar.”

Clint looked over at Bucky, who tipped him a wink and grinned rather than just pretending not to notice like he had when this had actually happened.

“Okay, that’s worth a mimosa,” said Clint, getting up off his stool. “Introduce us.”

“Just stay subtle,” said Natasha as they headed back over. “I’m pretty sure he doesn’t want his sister to know.”

“No problem,” said Clint.

“I ran into an old friend at the bar,” said Natasha when they got to the table. “This is Clint. We used to be in the same circus.”

“Hi, sexy,” said Bucky, which was completely off script.

Clint snorted as the memory of Natasha continued on track, introducing Bucky and his sister to Clint. “Pretty sure your sister would have freaked out if you’d started with that.”

Bucky shrugged, standing up and moving away from the table, leaving the memory of his past self in place to shake Clint’s hand as Natasha sat down and pushed a chair at Clint. He stayed standing, letting the memory of himself take the chair and try not to let his eyes pop out at just how hot Bucky was.

The first time around Clint had spent a couple of hours trying to work out if he were being too optimistic about Bucky’s interest in him before Natasha had found an excuse to hustle Bucky’s sister off, after which it had taken about three minutes for Bucky to make a filthy innuendo and suggest heading outside. 

“As long as the evening still ended with us in that alley, it would be worth it,” said Bucky, pressing a kiss to Clint’s lips and then stealing his beer while he was distracted. He took a slung and made a face. “Oh Jesus, this is flat.”

“Yeah,” agreed Clint, reaching out to snag Bucky’s own bottle off the table. “I bet this one isn’t though.” He took a long gulp, draining it.

“Not quite what I meant when I was sitting there watching you at the bar and thinking I’d give anything to be able to buy you a drink without fear,” said Bucky, sighing as he dropped Clint’s bottle back on the table. “What memories do we have where we’d both get to have a drink?”

“The alley after,” said Clint, giving him a wink. Bucky snorted, but didn’t argue the point.

Pepper was still in the lounge with Tony when they let the past fade back into the present. “Ikea,” she was saying, disbelievingly. “You went to Ikea.”

“Yup,” said Tony. “It was actually kinda fun.”

She shook her head. “Tony, just...are you sure sleeping with this guy is worth all this?”

“Okay, I’m going to pretend you didn’t say that,” said Tony. “When you’ve met him, trust me, you’ll understand, and it’s not about sleeping with him. You know how many guys I could have slept with in the time since I met Steve, and just how hot they all would have been. This is different.”

She looked sceptical. “Tell me that again after you’ve slept with him.”

“Gladly,” said Tony. “And every other day after that.”

“Wow, you were right,” said Clint. “He really is smitten.”

“It’s so cute,” agreed Bucky, and actually reached out to ruffle Tony’s hair.

Tony clearly felt it, because he ducked down in his seat and whirled his head around. He waved his head through the air, batting through Bucky without noticing, then scowled. “Okay, this is getting ridiculous,” he said. “J, that cold spot…?”

“It’s currently next to you,” said JARVIS. “There’s another one by the door.”

Clint gave a wave. “Hello, that’s me.”

“Tony?” asked Pepper. “What are you talking about?”

Tony sighed. “Okay, you’re going to think I’ve definitely gone nuts if I tell you, and not just the kinda nuts where you want to take things slow and treat a guy with respect rather than jumping straight into bed with him - don’t look at me like that, I know when you think I’ve gone nuts and this thing with Steve has your eyes screaming it at me - No, I’m talking proper nuts, where you start considering the guys in white coats.”

“Tony, I’ve been considering the guys in white coats since I met you,” said Pepper.

Tony snorted. “Yeah, okay, that’s probably fair.” He tapped his fingers on his leg in a nervous gesture. “So, I’m kinda becoming convinced that this apartment is haunted.”

“Haunted,” she repeated. “Oh Jesus, Tony.” She rubbed a tired hand over her eyes. “How does this stuff always happen to you?”

“Hey!” protested Tony. “I’ll have you know this is the first time I’ve been haunted. That I know about.”

“Don’t flatter yourself, pal,” said Bucky. “It’s not you we’re haunting. I’m haunting Clint, and Clint’s haunting the apartment.”

Pepper let out a very long sigh. “I’m going to need another mimosa for this one,” she said and Tony jumped up to get her one, but Clint wasn’t paying attention any more.

“Wait, you’re not haunting the apartment as well?” he asked Bucky.

Bucky gave him a look as if he were an idiot, which after eighty years of joint-haunting, might be fair. “Of course not,” he said. “I didn’t even die here. I’m just sticking wherever you are.”

How the hell had Clint never realised that before? “So, you can leave it?” he asked, because he’d spent the first couple of years trying anything he could to get past the solid boundaries drawn around his existence. He could go anywhere that had counted as their home: their rooms, down the hall to the bathrooms, even up to the roof, but any further was like walking into a brick wall. When the big renovation had taken place and they’d turned the whole floor into one apartment, he’d started being able to go into the areas that had been other people’s apartments, but he still couldn’t get past the front door.

“Of course not,” said Bucky. “I’m haunting you, and you can’t leave it. Why do you think I always get pulled along when you blink to another room?”

Clint thought back over eighty years of moving around the same tiny area together. “I don’t- I figured you were just coming along to find out what I was doing, or because, I don’t know. Because you didn’t want to be apart from me.”

“I don’t want to be apart from you,” agreed Bucky. “That’s why I’m haunting you, and why I get pulled along behind without having to do anything.” 

Clint couldn’t stop staring at him. “Why the hell are you haunting me if I’m haunting the apartment?” he asked. “One of us attached to a place and the other to a person? How does that even work?”

Bucky let out a long breath and ran his hand through his hair. “Yeah, I have a theory on that. Look, what was the last thing you remember thinking? Just before you died?”

They’d spent eighty years talking and sharing memories, but they’d never once brought up how they’d died. Clint felt like his blood had frozen. “I don’t wanna think about that.”

“Hey,” said Bucky softly, blinking over to wrap his arms around him. “I get it, okay? Me neither. I just figure the more we know, the more control we have.”

Clint took a deep breath and wrapped his arms around Bucky in return. “Okay, then we’re doing this at home,” he said, and blinked them both into their room. He clung on tighter as it faded back to his memory of how it had looked the minute before everything had gone wrong.

He’d had Bucky pushed up against the wall beside the door, suspenders already pulled down as he worked on his shirt buttons in between devouring his mouth. They’d just gotten in from the bar and it had taken all their willpower not to just start fucking in the stairwell.

When the front door burst open, it had taken him a split-second to realise what was happening, by which time it was too late.

He let the memory play and watched from the outside, clinging onto Bucky as their memories of themselves were pulled off each other by the gang. Bucky had been hit by a bat a few times and Clint had tried to get to him, but there had been too many guys, and they pulled him back, throwing him to the ground and kicking at his ribs with heavy docker boots.

The moment paused. “What were you thinking?” Bucky asked, softly.

Clint took a deep breath. “That this was our home, and how dare they burst in and violate it? This was our space, the place we were able to just be with each other without worrying, and they were taking that away from us. From me.” 

Bucky’s arms tightened around him and he turned to kiss him, desperately clinging on to him as he tried to push the emotions away, but the memory had a hold of him now and he couldn’t get free.

“I didn’t want to lose the first home I’d ever had like that,” he said, just as the memory started playing again.

He closed his eyes so he didn’t have to watch the kick to his head that had killed him, but he heard the memory of Bucky’s voice calling his name as he realised what was happening. Clint opened his eyes to watch him fight back like a wild thing, throwing someone into a wall and yanking another guy’s arm around until it cracked.

It wasn’t enough. The guys who were still kicking at Clint, apparently unaware that there was no need because he was already gone, abandoned him to help the others, and Bucky ended up at the centre of a maelstrom of blows.

“I was thinking,” said Bucky, still holding on to Clint tightly enough that if he’d needed to breathe, it would have been a problem, “that I wasn’t going to ever let you go. That it didn’t matter how badly they tried to hurt us, I was going to stay right with you and fuck them all.”

The men dumped Bucky’s limp body on the floor next to Clint’s and took off, boots stampeding down the hallway. Bucky wasn’t dead though, not yet. He shuffled painfully forward on his stomach towards Clint’s body, reaching out for him.

“When I realised it was too late,” said Bucky, as the past memory of himself reached Clint and clearly realised he wasn’t breathing any more, “it was the worst thing I’ve ever felt. Knowing that I’d lost you. Fuck, I just wanted to be with you so much.”

He was crying, but that was okay, because Clint was crying too. He kissed him again, pushing the memory away and dragging them back to the present as fast as he could. “You are with me,” he said. “I’m right here. Bucky, I’m here. And we’re home. And no one is ever going to take that away from us.”

“Never,” vowed Bucky, and kissed him fiercely. Clint could taste the tears on his lips as he returned it.

“I can remember a bit of the hospital,” said Bucky, once they’d paused long enough for him to speak. “It’s a jumbled mess, but I knew I was there rather than wherever they’d taken you, and I hated that. When I died there, I came straight back here.”

“And I was waiting,” said Clint. He could remember that, waking up all alone while cops trampled over the crime scene that their apartment had become. He’d been so confused and nothing had made sense until Bucky turned up a few hours later and kissed him until they’d both realised they didn’t need to breathe.

“Yeah,” said Bucky. “And that’s it. You’re haunting the apartment: our home, which those assholes tried to destroy, and I’m haunting you, because I’m not ever letting you go again.”

“You’ll never have to,” promised Clint. “You and me, until Brooklyn falls into the sea, right?”

“Right,” agreed Bucky.

****

“Okay,” said Tony, turning on the enormous TV screen but not bringing up any movies just yet, “I’ve got to go through all this with someone or I’m going to go nuts, because it’s all making too much sense but I’m a scientist, Steve, I’m not meant to go around trying to prove that Casper is living in my house.”

Steve let out a sigh. “I thought we were going to watch a movie.”

“So did I,” said Clint, slumping sideways on the sofa until he rested against Bucky. He’d started looking forward to Steve coming over, because it meant he got to snuggle with Bucky on the other sofa and watch a movie. It kinda felt like a double date.

“We can do that after,” said Tony. “JARVIS, put the footage up. Look, Steve, just...I get the whole premise is crazy, but can I just show you the evidence so you can tell me if I’m reading too much into it?”

Steve waved a hand at the screen. “Okay, okay. Go on.”

Tony grinned at him. “Thanks, babe, you’re the best.”

“Don’t call me babe.”

“Sure,” said Tony, in a tone that meant he would be doing exactly that, often.

Bucky leaned over to whisper, “Babe,” in Clint’s ear.

Clint sniggered and patted his knee. “Sweetheart,” he said in response.

“Okay, so, this is an infrared video of the apartment,” said Tony, waving at the hazy coloured image on screen. “Look, you can see the heat from the electronics here and here, yeah? This is from this morning, just after I left.”

“You set up infrared cameras?” asked Steve. “Tony…”

“No, shush,” said Tony, flapping a hand at him. “No talking about how I’m taking this too seriously until after. JARVIS was getting weird heat readings, it made sense to set something up that could capture that properly. Anyway, look, this is what I wanted to show you.”

On screen, two darker, bluer patches had appeared and were drifting across the room towards the window.

“That’s us!” said Clint, sitting up. “Look! We’re on TV!”

“A couple of cold spots,” said Steve. “So, what? The apartment you bought in an old building has draughts? Tony, I don’t-”

“No, nope, keep looking,” said Tony. “I’ve been trying to convince myself it’s draughts, but why would they be going _towards_ the window? And then there’s this bit.”

One of the blue shapes suddenly whooshed backwards, flipping around as it went.

“You were doing somersaults to impress me,” said Bucky.

“Yeah,” said Clint. “Wow, if I’d known I was on camera I’da thrown in some fancier moves.”

“Huh,” said Steve, sitting forward. “That’s weird.”

“Right!” said Tony, “and then there’s- J, show the other bit. Because most of the time they’re just sort of….blob-like, and fuzzy at the edges-”

“Fuzzy at the edges,” muttered Clint. “I’d like to see him retaining such a cohesive form after eighty years of being dead.”

“I love your fuzzy edges,” said Bucky, kissing his cheek. Clint huffed and hunched his shoulders.

“But this bit,” continued Tony, as JARVIS put a still up on screen, “look here. What does that look like?”

The blue shape on screen had set its legs apart and stretched out its arms to the other figure. Right, Clint had made Bucky act as a base for him to somersault off his shoulders.

“It looks like a person,” said Steve, slowly.

“Yes!” said Tony. “Exactly!”

On screen, Clint’s blue blob ran at Bucky’s, flipping up and over him.

Steve let out a long breath. “JARVIS, are these...cold spots or whatever, are they here now?”

“They’re currently located on the sofa to your left, Officer Rogers,” said JARVIS.

Both Tony and Steve turned to stare at the sofa. Clint gave them a wave.

“Show me,” said Steve, and the image on screen changed to show the orange-y red shapes of Steve and Tony’s bodies as well as a more confused blue mass where Clint and Bucky were cuddled together.

“Okay, that’s kinda weird,” said Bucky, leaning forward. The shape on screen shifted as well.

“That is _incredible_!” said Clint, standing up so that he could see himself move on screen. He waved his arms and laughed. “Man, if we knew semaphore…”

Bucky stood up as well, moving away from Clint so that their temperatures didn’t merge together. “If you want to talk to them, we can always just actually talk to them.”

Clint made a face. “Not the same,” he said. “Besides, getting the living to hear your voice takes energy. This is easy.”

He waved his arms about his head again, then went down into a deep lunge, watching his shape squatting down.

“Holy fucking shit,” said Tony, backing a few steps away towards Steve. “Is that...Jesus.”

“Looks like they like being on camera,” said Steve, reaching out a hand to take Tony’s. “Okay, I give in. Your new place is haunted.”

Tony let out a choked laugh. “And I thought this was going to be a much longer presentation.”

“Hey, I wonder what happens if I do this,” said Clint, and delved back into the past to pull out the memory of his stage costume. On screen, his blob went darker and solidified around the edges, as if just the act of concentrating on his body were making it more real.

“Oh, that’s cool,” said Bucky, and pulled on the memory of his work overalls, oil smearing over his hands and face as he settled into how he’d used to look when he came home every evening. Clint didn’t look at the screen to see if his temperature had changed, because he much prefered looking at Bucky when he was dressed like that.

“Oh man, that was always such a good look on you,” he said.

Bucky sent him a wink. “I kinda figured you thought that after the first three or four times you molested me before I had a chance to wash up.”

Clint couldn’t keep his hands off him any longer. He blinked over to run his fingers over Bucky’s cheek, across a smear of oil. “How the hell did I get such a hot boyfriend?”

Bucky wrapped his arms around his waist. “Must be because you’re pretty goddamn perfect yourself,” he said, and kissed him.

“Oh man,” said Tony. “What the hell? Seriously, what the actual hell? There were definitely two of them before, right? And now it’s all one shape.”

“Looks like they’re hugging or something,” said Steve.

“Or something,” muttered Clint against Bucky’s lips.

“Okay, okay,” said Tony. “Right, well, this is all pretty clear, so I’ve definitely got ghosts. Wow, okay, let’s just take a moment to realign everything we ever thought we knew about the science of life and death, good, okay, now. What the hell do I do about them? Where do you get hold of an exorcist these days?”

“Why do anything?” asked Steve, standing up and edging towards Clint and Bucky, glancing at the screen to check how close he was. “They’re not exactly making blood run down the walls or whatever.”

He reached out a tentative hand, passing through Clint and Bucky’s shoulders, and frowned.

“Do you think we could even do that?” Clint asked Bucky. “How would that work?”

Bucky frowned. “I don’t know. I guess if we had any memories of blood we could use those, but I’m not coming up with anything.”

Clint had a sudden flash to watching his mother fly into a wall after his father had backhanded her and the way the blood had smeared across the plaster. He shuddered.

“Not sure I’d even want to, to be honest,” he said. Bucky’s arms tightened around him as if he could tell what Clint was thinking.

Tony frowned at Steve, putting his hands on his hips. “They’re fucking with the background electrical levels,” he said. “Which wouldn’t matter so much, but they’re mainly doing it in the room I’ve got JARVIS’s server in, and there’s only so much shielding I can put around him.”

“So move the server,” said Steve. He was still trying to touch them, waving his hand around as if it would just connect if he tried hard enough. Clint watched it for a moment, then gently reached out and poked his forehead. He put a bit of concentration behind it, so that Steve started back with narrowed eyes.

“It’s not exactly that simple,” said Tony, with a sigh. “Look, you said it yourself. This place is old. JARVIS is actually run across eight different servers in a whole bunch of different locations: the Tower, Malibu, a couple of other SI sites. Running him here meant putting in a server to handle all the location-specific protocols, but it needs to have instantaneous connection with the other servers because that’s where the majority of his programming is. That room has all the connections coming into it.”

“It’s like he’s speaking a whole other language,” said Clint. Steve had spent Tony’s speech rubbing at his forehead and then trying to reach out again with a frown that made Clint think he hadn’t really been understanding it either.

“Yeah,” agreed Bucky. He reached out and tapped Steve’s shoulder, then sniggered when Steve jolted back.

“Plus,” added Tony, “who’s to say they wouldn’t decide any other room I move the server to is their new favourite playroom instead? It’s not like that’s the only room they like to play around in. Maybe they’re just being dicks about messing with my stuff, which is just rude, frankly.”

Clint tapped Steve’s other shoulder and he whirled, then took two fast steps backwards. “I think they’re fucking with me,” he said, sounding surprised. Clint wasn’t sure why. Even the dead were allowed to fuck with people, surely? 

“Hard to blame them, you’re delicious to fuck with,” said Tony, then gave Steve a long, sleazy wink.

Steve rolled his eyes, turning away from Clint and Bucky. “Hilarious. Look, Tony, I don’t think you're going to be able to do anything. Either you just live with a couple of ghosts, or you move back to the penthouse at the Tower.”

“Nope,” said Tony. “Not happening. Do you know how long it takes to come see you when I’m there?” He frowned at the screen again, then back at where Clint and Bucky were standing. “No, okay, fine. I’ll learn to live with a couple of house guests. Pepper always says I’ve spent too long living alone.” He paused before adding, “Besides, there’s a couple of other things I can try to combat the electrical surges.”

“Not sure I like the sound of that,” said Clint.

“No, me neither,” said Bucky, frowning.

****

Contractors turned up two days later and Tony took them to Clint and Bucky’s room.

“What the hell is he planning now?” asked Clint as they started drilling the walls.

“Nothing good,” said Bucky grimly.

Clint stamped his foot, forcing it to connect with the floor so that the contractors heard the noise. “Okay, no. This is too far. This is our damn home, and I won’t let him fuck with it.” He projected force into his voice. “ _This is our home_.”

The contractors both jumped and stared around the room. “Dude…” said one of them.

“He said to just ignore anything weird,” said the other. “And, come on. _Triple pay_ , Malik. It’s gonna take more than some noises to pry that from my hands.”

“You have a point,” said Malik, and turned back to his drilling.

Clint looked at Bucky. “We’re getting them out of our home, right?” he said, and he hadn’t meant to sound like he was begging, but somehow it slipped out.

“Definitely,” said Bucky, giving the men a harsh glare. “Enough is enough.”

The guys proved to be more resilient than Clint had hoped for. When their drills sparked and died because Bucky had surged the plug, they just muttered angrily and pulled out replacements. When Clint kicked over their tool box, they jumped like rabbits, but stayed in the room, and Malik cleared it all up while the other guy, Brandon, kept on covering the wall with whatever Tony was having put in place.

When Clint and Bucky tried shouting at them, telling them to get out because this place was _theirs_ , they just put the radio on one of their phones, turning it up every time Clint took the energy to start screaming at them.

And that was the problem. Energy. Usually when he and Bucky were trying to haunt someone out of the apartment, they had a couple of days and could rest in between the exertion of manipulating the living world. Right now, they needed these guys to get out right now, before they finished whatever they were doing, but Clint was already tiring.

It didn’t help that he could still feel the weight of the cage Tony had put around the server box, draining energy out of him that he needed to terrify the workers.

“Fucking assholes!” he grunted, gathering all his concentration. “Why won’t you just _fuck off!_ ” He grabbed the metal that Malik was about to mount on the wall and threw it as hard as he could out of the doorway. It crashed into the corridor wall.

“Oh man,” said Malik, dancing back a few steps. “Seriously, this is some freaky shit, man, are you sure it’s worth it?”

Tony came sprinting in, clearly having heard the noise. “Okay, yes, it’s totally worth it, hey, let’s make sure of that, how about we double what you were already getting?” He picked up the metal and handed it back to Malik. “That sounds fair, right? And you guys,” he said, aiming his glare around the rest of the room, “you can knock it off. I’m just protecting my stuff, once it’s done you can knock yourselves out with your shit and no one needs to worry.”

“And we’re just protecting our home!” shouted Clint, but he couldn’t pull together enough energy to make himself heard. “Fuck!”

Bucky stepped up to Tony and pushed him, then shouted, “ _This is our home!_ ” at him, and Clint was impressed by how much energy he still had when Clint felt like he was already slipping.

“My home too!” said Tony back, quick as anything and clearly not bothered about communicating with a ghost. Apparently all it took was a couple of days for him to have adjusted to them as his new normal. He looked over at Malik and Brandon. “Keep going. In fact, how about I help?”

“Uh, sir, that’s not necessary,” said Brandon, with the kind of terrified look that said he was not at all prepared for working alongside a customer.

“Nope, it’s completely necessary,” said Tony, bending to rifle through the tool box. “I’m the one subjecting you to weird and unusual working conditions. Besides, I’ve got an hour before my friend gets here for dinner and it’s not like I’ve got anything else to do.”

It was a bad hour for Clint. He had no idea what the work was, but it felt like they were building a cage around his soul, sucking more and more energy out of him with every metal sheet they put up. He railed against Tony, hitting at him with his fists, but it was useless when he couldn’t even connect.

Bucky did better, ripping bits away and shouting at Tony, but it was clear Tony wasn’t interested in a dialogue about it.

“Seriously, calm down,” he said, replacing some wiring Bucky had managed to get hold of. “I swear, this is no big deal, basically just cosmetic.”

Brandon screwed in another metal sheet and it felt like a spear right through Clint’s heart. He let out a cry and fell to his knees, clutching at his chest.

“No!” cried Bucky, stepping towards him. “Clint!”

Clint could feel himself waver and clung on as hard as he could. “It feels like they’re killing me,” he said, and reached out to Bucky. “Bucky, please...I can’t-”

Bucky didn’t take his hand. Instead, he turned on Tony and his two workmen and did something Clint hadn’t even known they could do, pulling himself up to a couple of foot taller than he usually was, spreading out and going dark until he was a black shadow. “ _GET YOUR HANDS OFF HIM!_ ” he bellowed, and then grabbed Malik and Brandon and threw them out of the room, sending them crashing out into corridor with shrieks of terror.

“Oh shit,” said Tony, staring at him. “We made Casper angry.”

“ _GET OUT!_ ” shouted Bucky, and threw him out as well, slamming the door behind him. He then turned on the walls, tearing down all the metal they’d put up, and half the plaster too, until Clint could feel the strength returning to his limbs.

Bucky didn’t stop there. He turned on the black box and grabbed at it, ignoring the flash of electricity as he connected, and ripped at it, pulling it apart until a huge chunk came off in his hands with a shower of sparks. He hurled it against the wall, where it shattered into pieces.

“Oh fuck, Bucky,” said Clint, staggering to his feet. “You… that's incredible. I didn’t know we could do that.”

Bucky turned on him, fading back down into his usual self. He strode over and wrapped Clint up in his arms, gripping him tightly. “I’m not losing you again,” he growled in his ear.

“No,” agreed Clint, holding on. “Not ever.”

There was a series of loud bangs from the door and Bucky growled again, glaring over his shoulder at it. Clint could feel him keeping it closed and, now that he had some back, added his strength to Bucky’s.

“We’ll keep them locked out until Tony gives up and leaves us alone.”

“Let me in!” called Tony from outside. “Let’s at least talk about this!”

“Oh, now he wants to talk,” muttered Bucky. “ _Stay out of our home!_ ”

There was a pause, and then Clint heard Tony say, “Fuck,” very distinctly through the door. He rattled the handle again, but both Clint and Bucky kept it firmly shut.

“Hey,” said Bucky, “don’t worry about the door. I’ve got it. Don’t waste your energy.”

“I’m feeling a lot better,” said Clint, but he let his energy relax. “I don’t get where you’re getting all your energy from.”

Bucky’s arms tightened around him. “They were hurting you,” he said. “Cutting you off from our home. I’d do anything to protect you.” He tugged on a memory and they flowed back through time to their apartment, leaving only the modern door in place so that Bucky could keep it shut.

Clint didn’t recognise the exact memory Bucky had recreated. There was something cooking on the stove with the memory of Bucky standing over it, frowning slightly. His own memory was on the sofa holding a newspaper. It could have been any of a hundred evenings when Bucky had made dinner while Clint read out any interesting highlights from the paper to him. He let out a long breath as Bucky let the memories of their past selves fade away so they were alone in the room.

Fuck, it just felt so much better when he was home. He could feel the strength flowing back into him.

“Guess it’s a good thing we’re not both haunting this place, or we’d have been fucked,” he said.

Bucky kissed him, then hustled him over to the sofa without letting go of him, keeping him wrapped up in his arms as they sat down. Clint was more than okay with that. 

“I don’t know,” said Bucky, with a sigh. “Felt like the more you were being hurt, the more it hurt me. I guess I’m linked to you like you’re linked to the apartment. They were cutting you off from it so you got weak, so I got angry and, I don’t know. More powerful.”

“It was pretty impressive,” said Clint, turning so he could press a kiss to Bucky’s lips. “My terrifying poltergeist boyfriend,” he said, and earned himself a snort.

There was a knock on the door. “This is Officer Steve Rogers with NYPD. Can I come in so we can discuss this?”

“Oh, now he’s getting his cop boyfriend involved,” said Bucky, not releasing his grip on the door.

Steve knocked again. “Clinton Barton and James Barnes,” he said, and Clint sat up, staring at Bucky with surprise. “Please, let me in so we can resolve the situation.”

“He knows our names,” said Clint. “How the hell does he know our names?”

Bucky scowled. “Doesn’t mean he’s getting in.”

“Come on,” called Steve. “You can’t keep us locked out forever, we need to come to a solution.” There was a pause, and then he added, “Tony wants to apologise.”

“I want to do what?” said Tony, then cleared his throat. “Yep, okay, an apology. Just let us in so I’m not shouting it through a door, yeah?”

Clint looked at Bucky and raised an eyebrow. “If we can make it clear this is our space, maybe he’ll take all his electronic crap and put it somewhere else.”

Bucky let out a very long sigh. “If they try anything, I’m throwing his precious server out the damn window,” he said, but let the door swing open.

“On our terms, though,” said Clint, and he took a moment to gather his strength, then grabbed the memory Bucky had created and solidified it as hard as he could. He wanted them to see that they were fucking with their home.

Just the room, though. No point in letting them see him and Bucky, not when it would be more intimidating if they were unseen.

When Steve and Tony stepped inside, they blinked and stared around at the room with a gratifyingly surprised expression.

“Holy shit,” murmured Steve. He was holding a faded-looking cardboard file in his hand. “This is…”

“This is not my spare room,” said Tony. “Okay, wow, stepping back in time, that’s apparently a thing that’s happening now.” He reached out and poked Bucky’s jacket by the door, but Clint wasn’t holding the memory strongly enough for that and his hand passed right through. “This is incredible,” breathed Tony.

“It’s nice to be appreciated,” said Clint. 

Bucky snorted, then let go of him to stand up and walk over to Steve. He poked him in the chest. “Time for that apology,” he said, but he wasn’t pushing his words through to the living world and Steve couldn’t see him, so it just got him a start and a step backwards.

“Okay,” said Steve, taking a deep breath. “Okay, let’s talk about this.” He glanced at Tony and gave him a pointed look.

Tony huffed a sigh, then looked around the room. “Okay, so, I’m sorry if the shielding was upsetting you or whatever. I won’t do it again, but we need to figure something out. This,” he waved a vague hand at the room around them, “this is causing electrical spikes that are messing with the server for my AI.”

“So, move it,” said Clint, then took a breath and repeated that with some force behind it. “ _Move it. This is our home, we’re not leaving._ ”

“I don’t think he gets it,” said Bucky. “He just thinks we’re upset, not that it was killing you.”

“Hard to kill a guy who’s already dead,” said Clint. He blinked up from the sofa to next to Steve, turning his head to squint at the file he was carrying. It was a police crime report with his and Bucky’s names printed on it.

“Oh,” he said. “This is the report on our deaths.” He reached out for it, giving it a tug until Steve let go of it in surprise. “He must have gone into his precinct’s archives.”

He took the file to the memory of the table and put it down, because trying to keep a grip on a real object for longer than a few seconds got painful. He didn’t have a good enough grip on the table though, and it fell through to the floor.

“Damn it,” he muttered.

“James and Clinton,” said Steve. “That is you, right?”

“James,” said Bucky, making a face.

Clint raised an eyebrow at him. “Clinton,” he said, pointedly.

He lifted the file back up and Bucky came over to solidify the table. Once Clint had it settled, he flipped it open, and was immediately met with a photo of his own dead body.

“Oh, fuck,” he said, stepping back. 

Bucky slammed the file shut. “We don’t need to see that shit. We know what happened.”

“I had a look through,” said Steve. “The cops never arrested anyone. Is that why you’re still here? Unfinished business?”

Tony sent him a quick glance. “Please tell me you’re not intending to solve an eighty year old murder in order to clear the ghosts out of my apartment.”

Steve shrugged. “I thought you wanted your home back.”

“ _It’s our home,_ ” said Clint immediately.

“Okay, okay,” said Steve. “I get that, we both do. Just, wouldn’t it be better for you to move on or whatever?”

Clint glanced at Bucky, who just shrugged back. “I’m happy enough here. Where the fuck would we even move on to? What if it’s somewhere where we’re not together?”

“Yeah, that would suck,” agreed Clint.

Steve walked over to pick the folder up again, flicking through the report. “I couldn’t help but notice that this was pretty thin,” he said. “Two guys beaten to death in their own home, I’da figured there’d be way more investigation that this. It was almost like the cops already knew who did it, but they didn’t want to put it down in the file.”

“Oh wow, this is getting more like a made-for-TV movie all the time,” said Tony. “Why the hell would the police cover up a double murder?”

Steve shrugged. “Could be that whoever did it was too powerful for them to say anything, could be that they didn’t think they’d get enough evidence.”

“Could be that they thought it didn’t matter what happened to a couple of queers,” said Bucky, bitterly. “Those guys who killed us, they were all local fellas. Guys I knew growing up. Hell, one of them had a brother who was a cop. No way they were going to end up locked up over taking out a couple of faggots.”

Clint had never even thought about it. He’d not really recognised any of them, but then, he hadn’t had much of a chance.

“Okay,” said Tony, and then glanced around at the room. “So, would that help you guys? If there was some kind of resolution on who killed you?”

“ _We know who killed us,_ ” said Bucky.

Tony hesitated, then glanced at Steve. “That sounded like a no, right?”

“ _You can’t make us leave our home that easily,_ ” added Clint.

Tony sighed. “Okay, okay, I get it. This is your home and you don’t want me fucking with it. You’ve been very clear on that one. Look, can we...this is all great, loving the historic aesthetic, but can we drop it so I can check my server? I promise I’m not gonna do anything that will fuck with you, I just want to make sure it’s still in one piece. You kinda blasted it a bit earlier.”

“Him and his fucking server,” muttered Clint, but he obligingly let the memory fade to reveal how badly Bucky had trashed the room earlier.

“Oh man,” said Tony, glancing around. “Look at this mess.”

“Apparently, you really managed to upset them,” said Steve.

Tony went to crouch down over his server, wincing at the wreckage of the cage. “No respect for other people’s property,” he muttered.

“ _No respect for other people,_ ” said Bucky. “ _It was hurting Clint._ ”

“Hurting him?” said Tony, frowning. “Why would a Faraday cage hurt a gho- Oh. Oh, okay, I think I’m getting this now, Steve, you were right. I am gonna have to move the server.”

Steve stared at him. “I’m sorry, could you repeat that? And, hang on while I get my phone, I want to get a recording of it. Who was right?”

Tony rolled his eyes. “You were right. Happy? If the ghosts are specifically linked to this room, and they’re made up of some sort of electrical energy, then putting in electro-magnetic shielding would drain that, and trying to make the whole room a Faraday cage would have been…” He made a face. “Not good. Okay, now I feel bad, sorry guys.”

“As you should be,” said Bucky, crossing his arms and glaring at him.

Clint stepped close to wrap his arms around him from behind, kissing the back of his neck. “He didn’t know,” he pointed out.

Bucky relaxed back against him, but he didn’t stop glaring at Tony. “Doesn’t matter, he still hurt you.”

Steve bent down to pick up the file, which had fallen to the floor again when Clint had let the memory of their apartment go. “I don’t get why they’re pissed about that, but they’re not pissed about the cops not bringing anyone to justice for their murders.”

Bucky unfolded his arms so that he could rest them over Clint’s, taking hold of one of his hands and pulling it up so he could kiss his knuckles. “ _Because it backfired. They wanted us to be miserable, for us to lose each other, but instead we’ve had eighty years together._ ”

“ _Eighty excellent years,_ ” added Clint.

“Wait,” said Tony, looking up from his server. “You’re a couple? They killed you because you were gay?” He looked over at Steve. “And that’s why the cops didn’t do anything? That’s fucking bullshit.”

“Yeah,” agreed Steve, glaring down at the file in his hands. “I’d be fucking furious.”

Clint kissed the back of Bucky’s neck again. “The living are so hot-headed.”

“He says to the guy who ripped a room apart less than an hour ago,” said Bucky, amused. He turned in Clint’s arms so that he could kiss him properly. Clint wrapped his arms around Bucky’s shoulders and kissed him back.

“You’re my favourite hot-head,” he whispered against Bucky’s lips.

“All right,” said Tony, standing up from the server. “I think this is still in okay shape. If I move it to the back bedroom, will you guys leave it alone? I promise not to go building any shielding that might fuck with you. And I’ll leave this room alone, it’s not like I really need as many spare rooms as I have.” He glanced around. “Although, if you’d let me get a plasterer in to fix some of this mess, that would be great.”

“ _No metal_ ,” said Bucky.

“Definitely not,” said Tony, holding up his hands. “I told you, I didn’t realise what that would do. You’ll accept my apology, right?”

Clint grinned at Bucky. “ _One condition,_ ” he said, and Tony winced.

“Ah, yeah?”

Bucky was giving Clint a puzzled frown, so Clint kissed him quickly, then concentrated his energy to sing, “ _Take me out to the ball game, take me out with the crowd. Buy me some peanuts and Cracker Jack, I don't care if I never get back._ ”

Tony blinked, and then glanced over at Steve. “What…?”

“I think they want to watch a baseball game,” said Steve, a grin starting to take over his face. “You know, ESPN is showing the Mets playing the Yankees tonight.”

Tony groaned. “Oh man, really?”

“You’re the best boyfriend ever,” Bucky said to Clint and kissed him again.

****

Bucky got very involved in the game, to the extent that he ended up throwing some of the popcorn Tony had made at the screen. Clint just sat back and watched him, thinking about how hot he looked when he was so passionate about something.

Steve was vocal in his support as well but he was rooting for the Yankees, which riled Bucky up until he started throwing popcorn at him instead. Bucky was, of course, supporting the Mets, because _You support anyone over the Yankees, Clint, how do you not know that? ___

__“Jesus,” said Tony, ducking away from Steve to avoid being hit. “No one told me watching baseball involved shrapnel.”_ _

__“I told you it was an exciting game,” said Steve, gathering the kernels up and eating them._ _

__“And I very politely didn’t say that it went on for about a thousand hours without any explosions,” said Tony. “Robot Wars, now there’s a sport.”_ _

__“That’s not a sport,” said Steve._ _

__Clint sat up from where he had been half-dozing against the sofa arm. “ _What_ Wars?” He turned excited eyes on Bucky. “Bucky, Bucky, I _need_ to watch this.”_ _

__Bucky waved a distracted hand at him. “Sure thing, sounds great.”_ _

__Clint gave up on trying to get any of his attention while the first baseball they’d seen in eighty years was on TV. Bucky might love him enough to have haunted him for eighty years, but baseball was baseball._ _

__The Mets won, which made Bucky leap on the coffee table in order to yell, “ _Ha! Suck it, Yankee assholes!_ ” at the screen, which probably would have been better if he hadn’t put enough emotion into it that Steve clearly heard._ _

__“Okay, I’m changing my mind,” he said to Tony. “You should definitely get an exorcist.”_ _

__Tony laughed. “Too late, apparently I’m now co-habiting with two dead guys, at least one of whom hates the Yankees,” he said. “You’ve got no one to blame but yourself, you were the one who was all about going for the rational communication rather than just calling the Vatican. I’ve got the Pope’s private cell, you know.”_ _

__“Of course you do,” said Steve indulgently, leaning over to kiss Tony._ _

__Bucky frowned at them. “They were going to get the Vatican to exorcise us? That seems a bit overkill.”_ _

__Clint stood up off the sofa, stretching and rolling his shoulders. He shouldn’t be feeling tired or achy because he was an incorporeal spirit, but somehow it felt like he’d spent the day doing hard manual labour. He guessed that came from over-exerting himself while trying to kick the contractors out, and then from having the energy sucked out of him by Tony’s shield thing._ _

__“I’m getting the sense that Tony feels really strongly about his computer friend,” he said, then frowned. “Oh man, has he said anything since it all went down? We didn’t kill him, did we?”_ _

__Bucky glanced up at the ceiling as if there were anything to see, then shrugged before jumping off the table. “I figure if we had, Tony would already have three cardinals here with a bucket of holy water.”_ _

__Tony and Steve were still making out, ignoring the post-game commentary that was quietly droning on to itself. They looked relaxed and comfortable, and Clint realised that he wanted to be making out with his own boyfriend. He blinked over to wrap his arms around Bucky. “Can we go to our room and snuggle in bed?” he asked._ _

__“Of course,” said Bucky, kissing him._ _

__“Tony…” said Steve, and Clint glanced over to see he’d pulled away from Tony._ _

__Tony sighed. “I know, I know, you’ve got to go home. Can I just score a couple more kisses first?”_ _

__Steve cleared his throat. “Actually, I was thinking...it might make sense if I stayed over instead.”_ _

__Tony froze up. “What?” he asked, as if he could barely understand what he was hearing._ _

__“Well, there’s plenty of room here,” said Steve, giving him a smirk, “and I bet you have some clothes in my size that I could borrow. And I think someone said it’s closer to work, which would be handy tomorrow morning.”_ _

__Tony’s face lit up with glee, and he wrapped a hand around Steve’s head to pull him in for another kiss. “Seriously?”_ _

__“Seriously,” said Steve, and kissed him again, shifting to press their bodies closer together._ _

__“Okay, wow, I’m very pleased for them,” said Clint. “Let’s get the hell out of here before clothes start coming off.”_ _

__“Agreed,” said Bucky, and blinked them both back to their room, where he pulled the memory of their apartment back around them. “Unless it’s our clothes that are going to be coming off, of course,” he said, giving Clint a sly grin._ _

__One of Clint’s favorite things about being a ghost was that he didn’t need to bother with fiddling with buttons or pulling off socks. Instead, he just concentrated on the memory of what it had been like to be naked in front of Bucky, and then collapsed back on their beds to stretch himself out. “Like that?” he asked._ _

__“Fuck,” muttered Bucky, and followed him down, losing his own clothes in an eyeblink._ _

__

____

****

The next morning, Steve and Tony had breakfast together while giving each other adorably smitten little smiles. Clint wanted to pet them both, and then realised he could now that they knew he and Bucky were around.

Tony reacted to an affectionate hair tussle like an angry kitten, batting at the place where Clint’s hand had just been as if he had a hope in hell of connecting with him.

Steve just snorted and ran his hand over his hair to neaten it. “I think your roomies approve of us.”

Tony huffed a breath. “Freaking voyeurs,” he muttered. “Isn’t it enough that I’m gonna spend all day clearing up after them?”

“And whose fault is that?” asked Bucky, poking at the screen Tony had abandoned on the kitchen counter. It didn’t seem to want to work for a ghost.

“All day?” asked Steve. “What about tonight? I was thinking we could go out for dinner and celebrate having solved your paranormal problem.”

Tony brightened. “Oh, I am definitely up for that. Shall I meet you after you finish work?”

Steve shook his head. “I’ll have to go home and get changed. Maybe pack an overnight bag?” He raised an eyebrow at Tony, who nodded furiously.

“Yes, definitely do that.”

Steve grinned. “Okay, great. I’ll text you when I know what time I’ll be ready.”

“Okay,” said Tony. “You know, it might make sense if you just moved in here, and then you wouldn’t have to worry about having to pop back to yours for stuff, and you know. This place really is so much closer to your work, and there’s more space, and-”

Steve shut him up with a kiss. “You’re pushing again.”

“Yeah,” said Tony, leaning back in his chair with his mug wrapped in his hands. “Can you blame me? I mean, have you even met yourself? Of course I’m always going to be pushing for everything I can get. It’s worked out pretty well for me so far, hasn’t it?”

“Well, I’m not moving in anywhere until you’ve sorted out an amicable relationship with your roomies,” said Steve, draining his coffee and standing up. “So you’ll need to move that server today.”

Tony waved a vague salute at him. “Already planning on it. It’s not home without JARVIS, you know.”

“Of course not,” said Steve, in a tone of voice that meant he didn’t know. He picked up the crime file from the table and then hesitated, glancing around. “Do you think they want to know anything else out of here?”

Tony shrugged. “They seem pretty unbothered by the whole being-beaten-to-death thing.”

“Or maybe we’ve just had some time to get some perspective on it,” said Clint. “Eighty years is a long time.”

“I must say, I kinda dig their ‘a life well-lived is the best revenge’ philosophy,” added Tony. “Even if it’s more ‘an afterlife of gay loving is the best revenge’. Either way, it’s got style.”

“‘Gay loving’,” repeated Bucky, giving up on the screen to raise an eyebrow at Clint.

Clint grinned back. “Well, there’s definitely been a lot of loving,” he said, “and most of it has been pretty joyful.”

“It seems like their families knew about them,” said Steve, flicking to somewhere near the back of the file. “Or, at least, James’s did. Clinton’s body wasn’t claimed, so James’s family took it as well, and buried them together.”

Bucky turned to stare at him, eyes wide. “They did what?” he asked, completely dumbfounded.

Clint blinked over to wrap an arm around his waist. “We’re buried together,” he said, unable to keep the smile out of his voice. He’d always assumed that he’d just ended up wherever the state put him, because who was going to arrange a burial for him? Natasha had left town a year or two before they’d been killed, still trying to find a place for herself, and there had been no one else, no one but Bucky, who cared about him as more than a guy they sometimes had a drink with. “Oh man, that’s perfect. Your family are the best.”

Bucky turned to look at him. “They...my mom had us buried together?” he repeated. “She didn’t- she musta known. The whole neighbourhood woulda known what really happened, she’d have been facing down all those stares from people who thought it was a scandal that we were together, and then she...Fuck.” He took a deep breath, but Clint could see the tears gathering in his eyes. He kissed him.

“She loved you,” he said. “I guess she wanted to do what she knew you’d want.”

“Maybe we should go visit their grave sometime,” said Tony, then made a face. “Wait, is that weird? That seems like that might be weird.”

Bucky pulled Clint in tight, burying his face in his neck. “I thought she’d hate me if she knew,” said Bucky, emotion thick in his voice. “Fuck. _Fuck_ , Clint.”

Clint hung on tightly, pressing kisses to his head as Bucky let tears get the better of him. He looked over at Tony, who had taken the file from Steve to look at whatever it said about their burial.

“ _Get a photo_ ,” he said, running a hand over Bucky’s hair. He wanted to see whatever Bucky’s mom had decided a suitable epitaph would be, and he had a feeling Bucky would as well.

Tony’s head darted up and he looked around, then nodded. “Okay, got it. We’ll go for a stroll before dinner, how about it, Steve?”

“Sounds very romantic,” said Steve, taking the file back off him. “And now I really do have to go.” He leaned down and kissed Tony, and then left.

Tony stared after him for a moment, then turned back to the room, glancing around as if he had a hope of seeing Clint and Bucky, still clinging tightly together. “Okay, I’m going to be doing work in your room now. Please don’t go crazy poltergeist and try and kill me, I promise I’m just taking stuff out. And the plasterer is coming this afternoon, it would be super-awesome if I didn’t have to pay him a ‘sorry a ghost made you crap your pants’ bonus, those really start to add up after a while.”

Clint kept rubbing his hand over Bucky’s shoulders. “ _Agreed,_ ,” he said, and Tony wandered away.

Bucky took a moment longer, then raised his head with a deep breath he didn’t need to take. “I miss my mom,” he said.

Clint kissed him. “I miss your mom too,” he said, because it wasn’t as if he had many good memories of his own mom but Bucky’s mom had always been friendly to him, letting him tag along to holiday meals because he didn’t have anywhere else to go.

He wondered now if she’d known all along. Clearly, he and Bucky hadn’t been as subtle as they’d thought they were being if those guys had worked out what they were and been pissed enough to form a lynch mob. Had Bucky’s family known as well? He could remember good-natured ribbing about how neither of them seemed to be able to find a girl, had that just been part of the joke?

Fuck, they’d probably never know. He took a deep breath and kissed Bucky again. “Want to go to a memory of her?” he asked.

Bucky thought for a moment, then nodded. “That last Thanksgiving,” he said, and they pushed through time to bring up the memory together.

****

Tony was as good as his word. He cleared all his electronic devices out of their rooms and moved the server to the spare room that was furthest away, then put a sign on the door that said, _No ghosts allowed_ , with a picture of a little cartoon ghost with a line through it.

Clint retaliated by waiting until their room had been replastered and decorated, then borrowing some paint to write _The Realm Of The Dead_ on the door. It took a lot of energy and concentration, but it was more than worth it to see Tony’s face the next morning.

Tony stared at it for a very long time. “Oh great, you think you’re funny,” he said to the air.

“I’m hilarious,” said Clint.

Bucky snorted. “Sure, doll, you keep believing that.”

Clint just grinned at him, then walked back through the door into their room, with its blank white walls waiting to have a thousand memories broadcast on them.

Blank, that is, except for one carefully framed photo of a gravestone.

_James ‘Bucky’ Buchanan Barnes_  
_March 10, 1917 - August 13, 1939_

_and_

_Clinton Francis Barton_  
_January 7, 1918 - August 12, 1939_

_But now abideth faith, hope, love, these three; and the greatest of these is love._


End file.
